As Muncie Public Library celebrates its sesquicentennial in 2025, our community also celebrates a milestone, 160 years as an incorporated city in Indiana. It’s appropriate that we both acknowledge important anniversaries as it reflects the link between Muncie Public Library and its community. As Muncie-Center Township has grown, so have we and vice versa. Therefore, an understanding of our community’s history is essential to the story of Muncie Public Library over its 150 years of service.
Muncie became an incorporated city in Indiana in 1865, but its history began long before then with the indigenous peoples who inhabited East Central Indiana, living along the waterways of the White, Mississinewa, and Whitewater Rivers. At the time of European contact, groups of Miami and Lenape peoples were living along the White River, but with continued white settlement within the state, the tribes were forced to move west after the War of 1812. The Lenape, Miami, and other tribes of Native Americans signed the Treaty of St. Mary’s ceding their lands within the new state of Indiana. However, reservations of land were awarded to individuals or small groups of Native Americans. One such reservation, known as the Hackley Reserve, was owned by Rebecca Hackley, granddaughter of the Miami Chief Little Turtle. Goldsmith Gilbert, a white trader, bought the land from Hackley in 1825, and this 672 acres of land just north of the bend along the White River became the core of what we now know as Muncie.
Pioneers like Gilbert who came to Delaware County began to tame the wilderness as farmers and depended on each other for help with major tasks. Once that was done, they began to organize communities, and Delaware County started to take shape. The county was officially formed by an act of the Indiana General Assembly on January 26, 1827.
Muncie continued to grow and thrive throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century. New buildings were constructed, including the new Italianate style courthouse. Businesses did well. Streets improved, and more and more homes and businesses saw the introduction of electric lights. This was the state of the Muncie-Center Township community when the announcement came that natural gas had been discovered in Eaton on September 15, 1886. Realizing the importance of the discovery, the town quickly moved to explore the possibility of natural gas underneath Muncie, and their efforts were soon rewarded in November.
The gas boom along with the industrial revolution, with its railways and new technologies, propelled Muncie (and Delaware County as a whole) into an era of extraordinary growth in industry, the arts, and culture. A number of groups like the Art Students League and Ladies’ Matinee Musicale formed during this period thanks to the increased interest in cultural pursuits. Naturally, this period of expansion also led to a significant increase in Muncie’s population.
Thanks to the ready supply of natural gas, many businesses relocated to Muncie. One such business was the Ball Brothers Company, and their investment into the community would have a huge impact on the future of Muncie.
The Ball brothers (Edmund, Frank, George, Lucius, and William) began their company in Buffalo, New York in 1880 manufacturing wood-jacketed cans. The business progressed over the next few years to kerosene containers used to refill lamps and stoves, and finally, they started manufacturing glass jars for use in home canning by 1886, a product for which they eventually became famous. However, a fire destroyed their factory in Buffalo, NY that year. With little money on hand, they began looking for low cost options to restart the business in the Midwest.
Frank C. Ball, President of the Ball Brothers Glass Manufacturing Company, investigated several options before visiting Muncie, Indiana at the invitation of the city. Although he didn’t find anything particularly noteworthy about the location, Frank did find the men “courteous, kind, and businesslike” (Ball, p. 13), and so, the Ball Brothers relocated to Muncie, Indiana. The town gave them $5,000 in addition to seven acres of land to build a plant. Construction on the new factory began in 1887, and the next year saw the first glass jars produced in the new plant. Thus began a long history of industry and philanthropy within Muncie. Not only would the business stay in the community for many decades to come, but it would also give back to the city by donating generously to the YMCA, Ball Memorial Hospital, Muncie Public Library, and many more organizations. One of the Ball Brothers' most significant contributions to the Muncie-Center Township community was the establishment of Ball State University, which continues to thrive today.
The history of Ball State University actually predates the Ball Brothers' involvement with the institution. The first iteration of Ball State began as the idea of three prominent businessmen: George N. Higman, George McCulloch, and Frank Haimbaugh, who formed the Eastern Indiana Normal University Association along with many other civic leaders in the community. The group founded the Eastern Indiana Normal University in 1899 for teacher education, but the school closed on September 24,1902 due to low enrollment numbers. Despite the fact that Higman, McCulloch, and Haimbaugh felt that a school for higher education would add to the community, they were motivated more by the financial possibilities of the institution. The expediency of investing in teacher education was the only realistic option at the time, but it would prove to be unsuccessful despite the numerous attempts to reestablish the school over the sixteen years.
The turning point came in 1917 when the Indiana General Assembly passed legislation allowing state educational institutions to receive private donations. The latest incarnation of Ball State University, known as the Muncie National Institute, closed on January 27, 1917 and filed for bankruptcy. The site came up for sale, and attorney Robe Carl White, representing the interests of Frank, Edmund, and George Ball, successfully purchased the school for $35,100 despite legal challenges by the other bidders. The Balls, in turn after months of negotiation, donated the property to the Indiana State Normal School in Terre Haute. On April 14, 1918, the Muncie National Institute became the Eastern Division of the Indiana State Normal School in Terre Haute, and Frank C. Ball was appointed to the board of trustees as part of the terms of the agreement in May. Thanks to the Ball Brothers, the community prevented outside interests from taking over valuable property in the neighborhood while also keeping options open for the development of the area.
Over the next decade, the college continued to grow and improve with the goal of eventually becoming independent from Terre Haute, and the Balls continued their support over the years. Frank Ball once again intervened in affairs and helped obtain state funding for the first campus building, Science Hall, which opened in 1923. Another generous financial donation in 1922 led not only to the construction of Ball Gymnasium but also a name change to Ball Teachers College, Eastern Division, Indiana State Normal School in recognition of the Ball philanthropy to the school. By the end of the decade, two more buildings, Lucina Hall - also built with Ball funds - and the Library and Assembly Hall, were added to the campus.
Furthermore, the school separated completely from Terre Haute thanks to new legislation in the General Assembly. Starting on March 7, 1929, the school became known as Ball State Teachers College and shortly thereafter, it was accredited as a college by the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. Over the years, the college continued to expand, especially during the period after World War II when veterans returned and used their GI money to enroll in classes. Furthermore, the postwar era saw the college offering more and more options beyond the established teaching curriculum for both undergraduates and graduates, including a new school of architecture. This, along with other developments like the institution of a Faculty Advisory Council, led to the college receiving university status. In 1965, Ball State Teachers College became Ball State University, and it has been known by that name since then.
Ball State University continues to grow and expand but still manages to maintain a small town feel. Students receive more personalized learning and have opportunities to apply classwork to real problems with the university’s immersive learning program. Ball State prides itself on molding entrepreneurial thinkers with its educational programs, which is perhaps something that the school has retained throughout its history thanks to the entrepreneurial businessmen who founded and supported it.
While Ball State continued to find its footing as an educational institution in Muncie, industry and businesses, which had already been thriving at the end of the gas boom era, continued to grow thanks to the automobile and the demand for goods after World War I. In fact, automobile manufacturing became one of the dominant industries in Muncie and Delaware County providing jobs for many in East Central Indiana. Because of this, population in Muncie grew by 50% from 24,005 to 36,254, and more buildings continued to be constructed. This growth made Muncie eligible, along with other considerations, for the Middletown study by two sociologists Robert S. and Helen Merrill Lynd. The Lynds wanted to study how thirty years of “accelarated industrialization in the nation had changed people’s values and priorities, especially with regard to religion” (Spurgeon, p. 58). The study Middletown was published in 1929. The Lynds later came back to Muncie in the 30s not only to study how the community was faring during the Great Depression but also to correct errors in the initial study, which led to the publication Middletown in Transition. Thanks to both of these studies, Muncie became known as the typical American city. However, the original studies did have gaps and left out minority groups within the studies. Most notable were the African American population as well as the Jewish residents of the city. Middletown Jews and The Other Side of Middletown, published in 1997 and 2004 respectively, worked to fill in those gaps.
When the U.S. entered World War II, Muncie’s industrial machine turned to manufacturing wartime products for the military, and women entered the workforce as men went to war again. Goods such as gas, tires, food, coffee, hosiery, and shoes were rationed while the county practiced black-outs despite the fact that the possibility of an air raid was very slim. Residents bought war bonds, started victory gardens and canned their own food, donated items – things such as rubber, paper, rags, clothing, and metal – to the various scrap drives organized by various groups, and sent gifts to soldiers. It was a time when the community banded together from the old to the young to help with the war effort in any way they could.
After World War II, Muncie, like the rest of the United States, experienced postwar growth in population, and as a result, the city faced shortages in areas like housing, education, and medical care. Muncie was also still an industrial center after the war, but changes were on the horizon, which could probably best be summed up by the closing of the Ball Brothers’ glass factory in the early 1960s. However, the business still had its corporate headquarters here in Muncie and had evolved to produce other products like plastics, zinc, and would even have an aerospace unit producing spacecraft. Many of Muncie’s other industries had to follow suit by either closing or evolving their business as the economy changed.
Over the second half of the twentieth century, Muncie still had a manufacturing focus, but it continued to dwindle as the new millennium approached. As Muncie's manufacturing sector declined and factories in the area closed, jobs in the service sector grew, specifically in areas such as healthcare and education. Ball Memorial Hospital, which opened in 1929 on land provided by the college, has had multiple expansions over the years and has a close relationship with the university. In turn, Ball State University tried to secure a school of medicine. Although the effort was unsuccessful, the IU School of Medicine does have a Muncie campus in collaboration with Ball State University training future medical professionals. Furthermore, BSU has a school of nursing, which had started initially as part of the hospital’s training program. Now called IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital, the institution is now one of the biggest employers in the area along with Ball State University.
Muncie-Center Township has seen some hard times in recent years. Although Muncie still has some manufacturing jobs in the area from companies like Muncie Power Products and Progress Rail, none employ as many workers as those from the past. The last, major industrial powerhouse, the BorgWarner Corporation, closed in 2009, and left many in the area without jobs. Because of this, the population of the city itself keeps shrinking, and we’ve seen the effect of that in our schools, businesses, and libraries to name a few. However, there is hope. The community has many existing partnerships with Ball State University to help resuscitate the city. Downtown Muncie has also gone through its own revitalization in recent years and has become a destination for events like Fire Up Downtown, the ArtsWalk, and the Gobble Wobble.
Throughout Muncie Public Library's 150 years of service, the organization has always strived to meet the needs of our community. Most recently, the library has partnered with local educators to help the county's literacy rates with programs like Great Achievers, Ready Readers, and 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten just to name a few. To help with the digital divide, we provide computer labs at all of our locations, have a Tech Tutor program to help teach technology basics, and provide hotspots available for checkout to those who lack internet access. We also have great informational programs like Legal Aid, Open Door Connections, and AARP Tax Assistance that help people connect to aid and information that they need in their daily lives. These are just a handful of ways that MPL serves, and as our community's needs evolve, so will our services. We've done this for 150 years, and we hope to continue serving our community for another 150 years to come.
Ball, Edmund F. From Fruit Jars to Satellites: The Story of Ball Brothers Company Incorporated. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1960.
Blodgett, Richard. Signature of Excellence: Ball Corporation at 125. Old Saybrook, CT: Greenwich Publishing Group, Inc., 2005.
"Camera Glimpses of Centennial Parade." (10-01-1927). Muncie Evening Press. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Edmonds, Anthony O. and E. Bruce Geelhoed. Ball State University: An Interpretive History. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2001.
Emerson’s Muncie Directory, Muncie, IN. (1881-1898). Microfilm collection. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Flook, Chris. "Chief Munsee Did Not Exist." (03-30-2020). https://caflook.medium.com/chief-munsee-did-not-exist-c56bd52e6af0
Flook, Chris. Native Americans of East-Central Indiana. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2016.
Greely Lumber Company. (n.d.). Minnetrista Heritage Collection. https://minnetrista.rediscoverysoftware.com/mhome.aspx.
Greene, Richard A. The Indians of Delaware County. Fort Wayne, IN: Fort Wayne Public Library, 1954.
Griner, Ned H. Gas Boom Society. Muncie, IN: Minnetrista Cultural Foundation, 1991.
Home Page. City of Muncie. Core Business Technologies. 2024. https://www.muncie.in.gov/images/misc/social-logo.png.
Hoover, Dwight W. (Bill). Magic Middletown. Muncie, IN: Muncie Newspapers.
“Naming History.” Ball State University History Resources in Archives and Special Collections. August 14, 2024. https://bsu.libguides.com/achivesBSUhistory.
Oil Field. (1886-1905). Mike Mavis Collection. Delaware County Historical Society. https://delawarecountyhistory.catalogaccess.com/home.
Postcard collection. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Robert S. Lynd photograph. (n.d.). Richard A. Greene collection. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Ryan family members. (1885). Marsh and Ryan Family Collection. https://dmr.bsu.edu/digital/collection/MarsRyan.
"Schools Aid in Home Garden Campaign." (06-09-1943). Muncie Evening Press. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Spurgeon Jr., Wiley W. Muncie & Delaware County: An Illustrated Retrospective. Woodland Hills, CA: Windsor Publications, Inc.
Spurgeon Jr., Wiley W. (Bill). Muncie at the Millenium. Muncie, IN: Muncie Newspapers.
Sutton, Wilbur E. "Comment." (09-23-1942). Muncie Evening Press. Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.
Wagner, Krista. Warner Gear (7111). Carnegie Library. Muncie Public Library.